


more than human

by GhostNox181



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 01:01:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16506203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostNox181/pseuds/GhostNox181
Summary: It happens so slowly, nobody notices.





	more than human

It happens so slowly, that by the time he catches on, it’s too late.

The symptoms are gradual, normal things that never seem out of place. Sleepless nights attributed to an abundance of energy or to wanting to be on at the same time as his friends. Increased caffeine intake and longer hours spent in front of the computer are the reasons for the near-constant headaches. Memory lapses explained away due to lack of sleep, to stress, to having so many things to do and not an adequate way of keeping track of all of them.

It’s a cold, he rationalizes one morning when he wakes up feeling nauseated. Just a cold, he tells everyone when he stumbles because the world spins around him. Just a cold, he tells his fans as he apologizes for that day’s video being late.

Just a cold he thinks as he shuts the blinds tightly, closing his bedroom off to any light, crawling into bed at two in the afternoon. Just a bad cold. And just like a cold, two days later, he’s fine again.

Or maybe that’s what the virus wants him to believe.

It happens so slowly, that by the time he realizes the glitches in his videos aren’t a technological error – that they’re intentionally added in editing – he’s already lost.

The viewers latch on to his silence about it – they feed on the mystery of the whispers behind the game audio, building ideas and throwing around concepts. _What could it be?_ they ask, as if he’ll tell them he doesn’t know. _What’s going on_?

They think he’s playing dumb to entertain, to build the suspense. Creating a character like Mark did. Giving the fans something new, something inventive, something dangerous. He’s just acting, they reason, when he turns around mid-video to check if anyone is behind him. He’s setting up the fans for something big, they think, when a message flickers across the screen, so quick, so brief, that the fanbase relies on even quicker fingers to screencap the moment.

 _I’m coming_ it reads. The viewers go wild.

When he says he’s not sure what’s happening, they think it’s part of the act. They don’t realize it’s an apology for the errors in video quality. They don’t realize he’s telling them it’s not him. Because, they decide, it’s _not_ him. Not exactly.

Theories begin when the next glitch appears several videos later – longer this time, more obvious, even though he remains oblivious to the interruption. A flash of a face overlays his in the facecam, a side profile, just out of focus. No amount of pausing, of zooming, of sharpening brings the face into clarity. It doesn’t matter. He’s coming – and they’re ready.

The fans buy into the anxiety in his voice when the whispers in the audio get louder, when the glitches get even longer. They believe he’s preparing them for the big reveal, the big moment when he releases this new content, this new idea. That he’ll give this new character a name in time, will explain in time what’s going on. They wait. They’re eager.

But the name never comes from his mouth. He persists in his denial, refuses to acknowledge anything is happening. So they give it a name instead, and the first whisper of it coincides with the worst headache he’s ever had. _Anti_ , they call it. _Anti’s coming_.

The surprise on the glitch’s face when it manages to last a few seconds in the next video is genuine. Surprise turns into determination, into glee as each subsequent video results in clarity, in focus, in a face everyone recognizes. It’s him, they exclaim. It’s Anti.

He gives up trying to reach out for help. The fans like this new idea, whatever – or whoever – it is. Behind the screen, sleepless nights grow more numerous. Blank spots in his memory occur more frequently – never more than a few seconds, minutes, but enough to notice. He tells his friends, something’s wrong, something’s happening to me – but they’ve seen the videos. They tell him to get some sleep. They tell him to take a break if he needs it.

They, like the fans, are blind.

He wakes up from a dream a few weeks later, shaking and shivering. He’s not in bed anymore – he’s in the forest. It’s snowing and he’s cold and he doesn’t remember how he got there. He doesn’t remember going to sleep. Something rustles behind him and he turns, only to realize the rustle is a word, and the word is spinning through his mind. _Sleep_ it tells him. _Sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep…_

The voice sounds familiar, but he obeys, even though he doesn’t want to. When he wakes again, he’s home, and a video has been opened on his computer. He doesn’t remember recording it – the title says _upload me_. He tries to watch it, but when there’s nothing but static, he tries to delete it instead. An error screen pops up that says _upload it, upload it, upload it_ in twitching font, in changing letters. The only option is to hit okay. It must be a prank, he decides, even as a chill runs down his spine. He can explain on twitter later, he thinks, as he clicks okay.

It seems normal when he watches it later. He begins to wonder if he imagined the whole error box event – if he was still shaken from his nightmare, as he’s decided the forest must’ve been. Maybe he’s overtired. Maybe he needs to take that break after all. Clicking out of the video, he doesn’t see the end – doesn’t get to witness the face that turns to look at the camera, the manic grin that graces the screen, the twitch in video quality as white noise leaks from the speakers, a message hidden within for those fans dedicated to finding it.

 _I’m free_.

It stops after that. The green-red interruptions on his videos vanish. The whispers fade until they disappear. Fans comb through old videos to catch a glimpse at those hidden messages again – but they’re gone too. Where there once was a shadowed face illuminated by sickly colors, now there is just him, as always, as there should’ve been. As quickly as the glitches appeared, they’ve disappeared. Fans begin to wonder – was it a game? Did they make it all up? Is this part of the plot? (It seems pretty deliberate, going back through to erase the evidence, they reason).

Things, it seems, have returned to normal.

By the time the video goes live, he can’t be saved.

 _Say Goodbye_ the title warns anxious viewers. It’s not meant to be a joke – he had it titled something different, after all. He thought nothing could go wrong with a vlog – there was nothing dangerous about carving a pumpkin. A special holiday treat.

The fans cheer when it goes wrong. They wait with baited breath as the creature they’ve only glimpsed in flashes, in glitches, comes to life. Is there, whole, very real. They scream in excitement as this being, this _Anti-Jack_ kills their beloved gamer, as it threatens them. They drink it all up, the energy, the terror, the chaos. It’s all an act, they know. It’s all for fun, they say. It’s just a prank.

He thought killing his host would grant him the fear he sought from the world, but they are not scared. They _adore_ him. They want _more_.

Fear, the virus decides, is useless, when he has an army all too eager to say his name.


End file.
